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This article is more than 1 year old
Ex-Intel engineer now AMD strategy chief
Girding loins for battle with Chipzilla
The new AMD CEO Rory Read is getting close to building the executive team that he intends to take into battle against archrival Intel with the appointment of Rajan Naik as senior vice president and chief strategy officer.
A year ago, former AMD CEO Dirk Meyer was shown the door. Intel's gadfly in the x86 chip space, and Nvidia's main competitor in the market for discrete graphics processors, did not explain why at the time, but it is reasonable to speculate, as El Reg did at the time, that part of the reason was AMD's slippage in the server space against Intel's Xeons and its lack of a low-power alternative to upstart ARM processors for smartphones and tablets.
Soon thereafter, the heads started to roll among the executive ranks at AMD, with Robert Rivet, vice president and chief operations and administrative officer (meaning he ran the company's supply chain, human resources, and internal IT operations), and Marty Seyer, senior vice president of corporate strategy, leaving the company in February 2011. After an eight-month search, AMD finally chose Read as CEO in August last year, just as the desktop and server processors based on the "Bulldozer" cores were being delayed by chip fab issues at GlobalFoundries and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp.
A month after coming into the CEO position, Read created a new server division at AMD and Rick Bergman, who came to AMD through the $5.4bn acquisition of discrete graphics chip and card maker ATI Technology back in July 2006, was let go. Bergman used to run the converged desktop and server Products Group at AMD. And just before Christmas, Nigel Dessau, who was SVP and chief marketing officer, departed too.
In October, Read hired former IBM, Apple, and Cisco Systems executive Mark Papermaster as its chief technology officer. Papermaster is no stranger to controversy, with his hiring by Apple contested after a long stint at Big Blue and his being the fall guy for the faulty iPhone 4 antenna.
In December, Read hired Lisa Su, a semiconductor researcher at IBM for 13 years who then worked at Freescale Semiconductor as chief technology officer and then general manager of its networking and multimedia products, to be senior vice president and general manager of the new Global Business Units part of AMD, which brings together all of the client, commercial, graphics, professional graphics, and game console products under Su. She got all three levels of her electrical engineering degrees at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and worked at Texas Instruments after getting her PhD and before joining Big Blue's Microelectronics division.
AMD chief strategy
officer Rajan Naik
AMD's newest exec, Naik, got his degree in electrical engineering from Cornell University and his PhD from MIT. After leaving academia, Naik was a member of the technical staff of Lucent Technologies, the spinout of Bell Laboratories from AT&T that has subsequently been merged with Alcatel and renamed . . . Bell Laboratories.
After leaving Lucent, Naik was a senior engineer at Intel for a stint, but has spent the past 11 years at management consultancy McKinsey & Co, where he was the founder of the company's Technology-Enabled Operations group. His focus has been on optimizing mobile workforces and call centers for McKinsey's high-tech, telecom, utilities and industrial clients.
In a statement, AMD said that Naik will be responsible for AMD's short- and long-term strategy development, including market opportunities, strategic partnerships, and investment strategies.
With his management team in place, now maybe AMD can figure out what businesses it wants to be in and how it intends to get the products to market that can better compete against Intel, Nvidia, and the ARM collective. ®


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It's been more than a little while since I've posted. But I saw this fellow and got INSPIRED. Now this is fabulous PADS. Wondering what PADS means? It stands for
Acts of
I love the fact that this dude is just totally jamming out for the fun of it. He's no movie star. He's just an average guy having a hell of a good time. He's obviously willing to put any insecurity he may feel about his body aside. He is totally committed. And I love that.
And lest you be tempted to not watch this piece of awesomeness all the way to the end, let me warn you that he totally sticks the landing. The ending is priceless.
I love the fact that the crowd gets in on his infectious sense of fun. In a world where it seems so many are ganging up to cause hurt and build anger and institute violence, it's good to know some people still can gang up to just have fun.
Jeanette DePatie AKA, The Fat Chick

subset: commoncrawl


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OK, I admit, my post on social bookmarking was a little tongue in cheek. Designed possibly to raise an eyebrow or two? Most likley, but I also like to play around with the medium of blogging. I was just about to call it an art form, but noooooo.
Posts like that are designed to get you thinking. How long does a blog post have to be. My answer to that is "as long as it needs to be". The style and objective of the blog will help define, plus the nature of the post. Are you trying to sell, inform, argue?
People bang on about the short attention span of internet users, I do this when talking about crafting headlines. But sometimes a long post is needed to lead people through an arguement to help define the points of view. I have seen successful blog posts that are similar to academic essays. Offering meat when everyone if offering lettuce is an interesting tactic.
This post could be quite long, but I have to go and get some sausage rolls from Truro.


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Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY (CNS) — The number of Catholics in the world and the number of priests, permanent deacons and religious men all increased in 2012, while the number of women in religious orders continued to decline, according to Vatican statistics.
The number of candidates for the priesthood also showed its first global downturn in recent years.
The statistics come from a recently published Statistical Yearbook of the Church, which reported worldwide church figures as of Dec. 31, 2012.
By the end of 2012, the worldwide Catholic population had reached 1.228 billion, an increase of 14 million or 1.14 percent, slightly outpacing the global population growth rate, which, as of 2013, was estimated at 1.09 percent.
Catholics as a percentage of the global population remained essentially unchanged from the previous year at around 17.5 percent.
However, the latest Vatican statistical yearbook estimated that there were about 4.8 million Catholics that were not included in its survey because they were in countries that could not provide an accurate report to the Vatican, mainly China and North Korea.
According to the yearbook, the percentage of Catholics as part of the general population is highest in the Americas where they make up 63.2 percent of the continent's population. Asia has the lowest proportion, with 3.2 percent.
During the 2012 calendar year, there were 16.4 million baptisms of both infants and adults, according to the statistical yearbook.
It said the number of bishops of the world stayed essentially the same at 5,133.
The total number of priests — diocesan and religious order — around the world grew from 413,418 to 414,313, with a modest increase in Africa, a larger rise in Asia, and slight decreases in the Americas, Europe and Oceania. Asia saw a 13.7 percent growth in the number of priests between 2007 and the end of 2012.
The number of permanent deacons reported — 42,104 — was an increase of more than 1,100 over the previous year and a 17 percent increase since 2007. The vast majority — more than 97 percent — of the world's permanent deacons live in the Americas or in Europe.
The number of religious brothers showed 0.4 percent growth worldwide. The number of religious brothers totaled 55,314 at the end of 2012. Slight growth was seen everywhere except the Americas.
The number of women in religious orders continued its downward trend. The total of 702, 529 temporarily and permanently professed sisters and nuns in 2012 was a 1.5 percent decrease from the previous year and a 5.9 percent decrease since 2007.
The number of candidates for the priesthood — both diocesan seminarians and members of religious orders — who had reached the level of philosophy and theology studies showed its first downturn since 2003. The number of candidates dropped slightly to 120,051 men at the end of 2012 as compared to 120,616 at end of 2011. Increase were reported in the traditionally vocations-rich continents of Africa and Asia, although the increases were modest; Africa reported 245 more candidates than in 2011 and Asia reported 179 more men in their final years of study for ordination.


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The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion CPU Performance
by Anand Lal Shimpi on April 28, 2006 10:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
Whenever a PC game pushes the limits of what current hardware can do, it generally ends up being fairly GPU bound. In the past, as long as you had pretty much any Socket-939 Athlon 64 you had enough CPU power to drive even the fastest single GPU video cards. You would typically be running at fairly GPU-bound graphics settings - even if you were CPU-bound, frame rates would be high enough that it wouldn't really matter. However, every now and then there comes a game that is an equal opportunity stress test on your system, requiring an extremely fast CPU as well as a high end GPU. Bethesda Softworks' latest hit title, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, is such a game.
In our initial article on Oblivion performance we compared high end and mid range PCI Express GPUs, discovering that we had finally found a game that was stressful enough to truly demand more GPU power than what is currently available on the market. Today's article uses the same benchmarks that we used in our first article, but focuses on finding the right mix of CPU and GPU performance for the best Oblivion experience.
It's worth stating up-front that we are not going to attempt to find ideal settings for every possible CPU/GPU configuration available. There are many tweaks that can be made that will dramatically improve performance on slower CPUs. Reducing the height of the grass as well as the density - or turning off grass entirely - will help a lot. Running without HDR, using medium textures, turning off shadow filtering... you can easily get performance to a level that many people will find acceptable, but it always comes at the cost of reducing the quality of the graphics - or at least the complexity of the graphics. We're interested in characterizing CPU performance under identical configurations for this article, providing an apples-to-apples look at how the Oblivion engine runs on a variety of processors.
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feraltoad - Friday, May 5, 2006 - link
I would have like to seem some High Resolution Benchmarks, or at least one. At 1680*1050 would this show that the CPU was no longer the weakest link with the Video Card Scrambling to render the scene? Would the exra mhz of the cpus still have a marked effect? Maybe you see the answers to these questions as obvious but not me. :( I play at this resolution. I'm sure some people complain but I've tried running around with fraps in different places and as long as the FPS doesn't seem to drop below 24fps then it isn't bad at all. If I look at an Oblivion gate I get 39 fps steady, granted this isn't with Dremoras trying to club me. I find that long views in towns (anvil) are rougher than the Oblivion gates. Perhaps its all the NPCs or shadows of buildings?
However, very nice article, and VERY DEPRESSING! Sad to see the Kings of the Video Cards struggle with a game this much. Also insanely pathetic to see that a fx60 will net you a whopping 9 fps in the most demanding part of the game. 9FPS?!? That's a frickin' $1000 dollar chip. You could buy it a $115 dollar A643000+ and OC it (just 250htt) to just 3500+ speeds and you only have a 9 fps difference from a $100 to a $1000 chip? That is messed up. (yeah I know you can OC the fx too, but still at $1000 would you expect that to be necessary? It should brew coffee w/the other core while using office apps. also I don't believe anybody buys a 3000+ w/out planning to OC) So much for "getting what you pay for". I guess it is comforting to normal people who can't drop a grand on the cpu alone.
I too would have like to seen if a Aegia Phyx chip would have made a difference by freeing up the cpu for other things. Aegia could have really gained some momentum if they could have had this game support their chip & had a board for around ~$150.
People keep talking about patches. Can a patch really signifigantly optimize a game anyway than decreasing quality for performance?
Jarred what is the biggest increase in performance in a single game that you have seen with new video card drivers? Can we expect Nvidia or ATI to dramatically increase performance with a drive update?
After all, this will hurt vid card sales if people can expect sub-mediocre performance from the best graphics cards. It will also boost 360 sales if they can't increase performance. Especially, when I release my patent pending super dongle that will allow two Xbox 360s to be used together in a SLI/Crossfire configuration. haha (j/k. but my dongle is quite super, I assure you. ;) -
moletus - Tuesday, May 2, 2006 - link
2 months ago, i was about to go shop 1900xtx for 600euros. Than i saw Xbox360.
Guess what! (hint: it costed with all the bells and whistles 550eur :)
Why on earth burn so much money when you can have all the chocolate(+AA and HDR) in the world for 1/3 of the money and still cant run the game?
Im no MickeySoft fanboy but the 360-ride has been surprinsinly smooth. -
The Black Cursor - Monday, May 1, 2006 - link
Both articles were quite informative, but I don't quite have enough information to make a decision between the upper-mid range GPUs and CPUs at similar price points,
ATI X1800XT vs. NVIDIA 7900GT
AMD A64 3700+ vs. AMD A64 X2 3800+
Any opinions?
Be seeing you...
---> TBC (To Buy Components) -
xFlankerx - Monday, May 1, 2006 - link
I say the X2 3800+ with the 7900GT. While the X2 most likely will not make a difference in the game itself, as noted by my last comment, it WILL provide for an overall smoother experience from your PC. -
xFlankerx - Sunday, April 30, 2006 - link
I just came from reading the Anandtech Oblivion CPU testing. I beg to differ with the conclusion that you need a fast CPU to get the most out of your GPU. I'm more of the opinion that the CPU and GPU handle different tasks. We know that the CPU is much stronger than the GPU in MOST cases. Now the CPU is what provides the GPU with instructions for what the GPU needs to do. If the CPU is already feeding the GPU more instructions than it can handle, then there is no point in having a faster CPU. See, there was hardly a difference in the FPS even with a 1.8GHz A64 when compared to a 2.6GHz A64, in areas where it's GPU-intensive. The Oblivion gates are by far the most intesive part of the game, GPU-wise. Now every single one of the single-card solutions bottlenecked the CPU in these cases. Only Dual X1900XTXs were able to take advantage of the CPU.
On the other hand, the Town benchmarks are influenced quite a bit by the CPU. This is easily explained when you notice that in a town, there is a lot for the CPU to calculate that is not in the Oblivion Gates. There are hordes of NPCs in a city, and the CPU has to control every single one of them (oblivion NPCs lead lives of their own, by far the most complicated AI in a game yet). Thus, the stronger the CPU, the better your frames per second in a crowded area will be. The clumpiness of all the videocards performance here somewhat reinforces the point.
The Dungeon benchmarks did surprise me. There is a decent amount for the GPU to render, though not as much as the other areas. However, there is very little for the CPU to render. And yet, we see quite a bit of improvement with a faster CPU. I'm not entirely sure how to explain that.
My point is, basically, that "You don't need a fast CPU to get the most out of your GPU." If anything, it should be the other way around, since the GPU is what can't keep up with the CPU. I think that the conclusion should be more like, "You need a fast GPU to handle the graphics of the game, but you will suffer a drop if FPS if your CPU cannot keep up with the AI in the game in crowded areas." -
kuk - Sunday, April 30, 2006 - link
Any idea on how a Core Duo setup would perform? -
ballero - Sunday, April 30, 2006 - link
Anand, are you sure that the performance increases are due to the game?
AFAIK Catalyst are multithreading driver. -
RyanHirst - Saturday, April 29, 2006 - link
Ok, I was just needling a bit about the opteron servers; I didn't really think they'd be a part of the test. :>
First, PCI-X x16 is standard on all dual-socket940 NForce professional boards, and several have 2 16x slots. I did forget that you can't do CrossFire on an Nvidia board-- but even just checking a server board with one, two, and four cores as a different test, would that not be worth a look?
Hyperthreading doesn't really answer the question. A (perhaps) 5% improvement with HT is consistent with the "6 of one...." results HT gives in dynamic multithread envirnonments (chess, say, or video games -- where the thread results must be compared to values from other threads, or completed within a certain time). There never has been any reason to assume that, because a progam does not get a boost from HyperThreading, it will not benifit from an additional full processor.
I'm not arguing that a dual socket-940 rig is mainstream, but should we argue about which is less relevant to 99.9% of the gaming public, an Opteron or a $1200 cross-fire setup? The point I'm trying to make is that regardless of how common it is, a multicore system could answer some questions that remain open. Namely,
--What are the maximal advantages of multithreading in this first generation of games?
Every review site seemed happy to pontificate on this subject when there was virtually no data, but now that there is a test candidate, no one seems interested in actually testing it.
Was it ever in doubt that you can improve a game's performance by throwing a CrossFire x1900xtx at it? No one would argue with this premise. *THE* question that chipmakers are taking revolutionary stands on for video games... is about cores. And I would just REALLY like someone to take a look at it.
Sorry that was long; I realized the first post sounded grumpy because I didn't explain my reasoning. Cheers, and I take the time to write this because your reviews are always the best; when I ask myself what information I would need to make an objective judgement about something, it's always information you present and analyze. Thanks again! -
RyanHirst - Saturday, April 29, 2006 - link
Oh, yeah and about the small boost in performance of the second core: since the multithread coding in Oblivion is (by their own statements) a result of their XBox360 version, I was assuming that the game would be generating low-complexity, nearly branchless threads, none of which would tax the extra processor at anything close to 100%... but that the game engine can generate a LOT of them. Is that not more or less the model of the XBox360 processor? -
JarredWalton - Saturday, April 29, 2006 - link
Xbox 360 processor is quite a bit different, and handling up to six threads over three cores. The problem is, it runs a completely different machine architecture, so it runs through different compiler. Even if their code to take full advantage of the Xbox 360 capabilities, they might not bother porting the entire spectrum over to x86. More likely -- and as far as I know there's no way to prove this -- the Xbox 360 version doesn't use more than about half the potential of the Xenon CPU. (Go ahead and call me "doubting Thomas". LOL)
Anyway, maybe Anand will find a time to try running a few tests on a quad core versus dual core setup. I unfortunately don't have access to any quad core systems. :(


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This article is more than 1 year old
Agency sues to stop Defcon speakers from revealing gaping holes
Sorry, Charlie
Defcon A transit agency in New England has filed a federal lawsuit to stop three Massachusetts Institute of Technology undergraduates from publicly presenting research at Defcon demonstrating gaping security holes in two of the agency's electronic payment systems.
The Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority (MBTA) also named MIT in the 17-page complaint, which seeks unspecified monetary damages for violation of the computer fraud and abuse act, negligent supervision and other causes of action. It also requests a temporary order preventing the students from "publicly stating or indicating that the security or integrity" of the MBTA's systems has been compromised.
The three speakers are Zack Anderson, 21, RJ Ryan, 22 and Alessandro Chiesa, 20, who on Sunday were scheduled to present research into both of the MBTA's automated payment systems. Although one method uses magnetic strip technology and the other radio frequency identification, the researchers say it's trivial to manipulate both cards to add hundreds of dollars in fare amounts.
"Disclosure of this information - if what the MIT undergrads claim is true - will significantly compromise the CharlieCard and CharlieTicket systems," the complaint states. "This in turn will harm the overall functioning of the MBTA's transit services."
Perhaps the MBTA hasn't heard of the Mifare Classic, the world's most popular RFID card, which just happens to be included in the CharlieCard. Last year researchers announced a way to crack the smartcard in a matter of minutes. The trio's research into the CharlieTicket is based on other weaknesses.
"It's pretty disappointing," Anderson told El Reg. "We initially called them to offer them our help in fixing these vulnerabilities. We have no intention of releasing details that would allow someone to replicate the attacks that can be done."
Representatives from the MBTA and MIT weren't available for comment.
The lawsuit, filed Friday in US District Court in Boston, capped a week of sometimes tense negotiations between MBTA officials, the students, and their instructor, MIT Professor Ronald Rivest (the R in the RSA cryptography algorithm). Earlier this week, a meeting at MIT was convened that included the students and their instructor, a MBTA official and a special agent from the FBI cyber crimes division.
"The MBTA official made clear the level of concern reached all the way up to the governor's office," Anderson said. "They wanted to know exactly what types of details we were revealing. They were pretty concerned about the tools" the students planned to release.
According to the complaint, the students refused to provide MBTA officials with the materials they planned to present at Defcon. The MBTA is the fifth biggest US transit agency with a ridership of about 1.4 million per day. Average weekday revenue is about $700,000.
The complaint takes issue with a presentation description that read in part: "Want free subway rides for life? In this talk we go over weaknesses in common subway fare collection systems. We focus on the Boston T subway, and show how we reverse engineered the data on magstripe card, we present several attacks to completely break the CharlieCard, a Mifare Classic smartcard used in many subways around the world, and we discuss physical security problems."
The description was later changed to remove the first line.
Anderson said the tools scheduled to be released helped streamline research into whether payment systems from other transit agencies were vulnerable to the same types of attacks. The students never planned to give tools or instructions showing how to add fares to the MBTA cards, he stressed.
This isn't the first time a powerful interest has sued to muzzle a Defcon speaker. In 2005 Cisco Systems took action against researcher Michael Lynn after he promised to demonstrate how to run a shellcode on a router without authorization. The two ultimately settled. NXP Semiconductor, maker of the cryptographically challenged Mifare card, has also taken legal action to silence researchers who poked holes in fare collection systems used in the Netherlands. A Dutch judge rejected the request.


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WALTHAM — Investigators quickly realized that the three men must have known whoever slit their throats in the early evening hours of Sept. 11, 2011. They also concluded that the grisly scene inside the Harding Avenue apartment — each victim laid out in a separate room, the bodies partially covered with marijuana — had to be the work of multiple killers.
"We know there were at least two people who are not in that apartment now who were there earlier," Gerard T. Leone Jr., then Middlesex district attorney, said on the following afternoon, explaining that there were no signs of forced entry at the apartment. "We should have other developments that we can reveal either late tonight or tomorrow early morning."
But there were no further developments. Investigators immediately compiled a list of individuals known to the three victims, including deceased Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev, but never released additional information about the slayings.
And for the next 18 months the investigation seemed to go nowhere, the killings written off by many as a cautionary tale of three low-level drug dealers who must have gotten in over their heads.
Now, in the days since an FBI agent fatally shot a Florida man just as he was allegedly confessing to the killings and implicating Tsarnaev, the case is suddenly part of the Marathon bombing investigation. The renewed interest has given hope to the families of the Waltham victims, but it also has raised a troubling question: If local investigators had solved the triple slaying, could they have arrested Tsarnaev and prevented four deaths and more than 260 injuries at this year's Marathon?
A definitive answer to the question remains elusive because law enforcement officials have refused to discuss details of the case, and because friends and relatives of the victims are reluctant to publicly criticize police or draw the attention of a killer if one is still at large.
Nevertheless, it is clear that investigators looking into the Waltham homicides, the worst crime in the city in more than a decade, initally had reason for optimism. Friends and relatives of the victims interviewed by the Globe said they readily provided police with the names of individuals who may have been familiar faces at the Waltham apartment, including Tsarnaev's.
They also underscored the date of the slayings and its significance to jihadists, the 10th anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, although they did not realize at the time that Tsarnaev was adopting increasingly radical Islamic beliefs.
Some friends and relatives also were able to estimate the time of the crime, shortly after 8 p.m. on Sept. 11, because their text messages and e-mails were not returned after that, a fact that might have allowed investigators to significantly narrow the pool of potential suspects.
Moreover, on the day the bodies were discovered by the girlfriend of one of the victims, the manager at Gerry's Italian Kitchen, a Watertown takeout restaurant, told investigators that someone at the Waltham apartment had ordered food in the early evening of Sept. 11, and that no one answered when a delivery woman arrived at the door.
"It was around 8:30 or 9 o'clock, something like that," restaurant manager Mina Askander said in a Globe interview.
But without an eyewitness or definitive forensic evidence, such as a telltale DNA sample, investigators were never able to identify a probable suspect in the killings of the three men: Brendan H. Mess, 25; Erik H. Weissman, 31; and Raphael M. Teken, 37.
"It was not because of a lack of effort; it was a lack of evidence," said Gary J. Marchese, a Waltham city councilor who represents the ward where the killings occurred and who spoke with investigators. "There were no eyewitnesses and it was a very difficult murder scene."
Still, some friends and relatives of the victims say that State Police, who were leading the investigation, and Waltham police had enough information to focus on Tsarnaev because of his close friendship with Mess and the fact that he did not show up for a well-attended memorial service for him at Ryle's Jazz Club in Cambridge.
"Pretty much every single one of us gave them Tam's name, especially after he didn't show up for the funeral," said a close friend of one of the victims.
But others said that although they gave investigators Tsarnaev's name, they never suspected him of killing the three men, especially his workout partner, Mess, until much later, when investigators named him as a prime suspect in the Marathon bombing.
"It does surprise me. It does shock me," said a friend of one of the victims when asked if Tsarnaev could have killed Mess. "But it does make sense if he was the Marathon bomber."
A law enforcement source with knowledge of the Waltham investigation said for the first time in a Globe interview that friends and relatives of the victims never encouraged police to take an especially hard look at Tsarnaev.
"Tamerlan's name came up in a very wide net during the course of the investigation," the source said. "But there was never any evidence or anything offered to investigators that led to his being considered anything other than one of a group of friends."
Tsarnaev was killed during a shootout with police three days after the Marathon bombing. His younger brother, Dzhokhar, the second Marathon bombing suspect, was captured the next morning and faces a possible death penalty. He is being held and treated for injuries at the Federal Medical Center Devens.
By the time of the Waltham homicides, Tamerlan Tsarnaev had already been investigated by the FBI for possible ties to terrorists in Russia. Although the FBI concluded that there was no basis for the alert from authorities in Russia, Tsarnaev's name was reportedly added to a terrorist watch list accessible to State Police working on the Waltham case through the local Joint Terrorism Task Force, an FBI unit in Boston.
However, an FBI spokesman said he could not disclose whether Tsarnaev's name was on the list at the time of the Waltham investigation because the names on the list are confidential.
Some friends of victims who spoke to police said investigators never appeared to be especially impressed by the fact that the killings took place on a date of great significance to Jihadists, or by the ritualistic nature of the slayings. According to one friend with knowledge of the crime scene, the victims were laid out in separate rooms, face down, their torsos covered with marijuana and their throats slashed.
"The feeling was, 'Holy [expetive] , this is 9/11. There's no way this is a drug deal gone bad,' " said one of the friends who spoke with the Globe. "Why are they trying to hush that away?"
In hindsight, friends and relatives of the victims have said they believe Tsarnaev and Todashev — an accomplished amateur boxer and mixed marial arts fighter, respectively — could be responsible for the Waltham homicides in part because only persons with significant physical strength could have overpowered the three victims without a shot being fired.
Both Mess and Teken were known for their accomplishments in the martial arts, while Tamerlan was a champion amateur heavyweight boxer and Todashev was an amateur mixed martial arts fighter.
But even now, questions remain about whether Tsarnaev and Todashev should be considered prime suspects.
Not one of the victims' friends and relatives interviewed by the Globe had even heard of Todashev before he was fatally shot by an FBI agent on May 21, during an interview at his Orlando apartment.
And while Tsarnaev's violent streak now seems clear, several friends were at a loss to explain why he would kill a group of men that included Mess, a former neighbor he had once called his best friend. Even an Islamic-inspired protest against marijuana seems unlikely, since the Globe could find no evidence that Tsarnaev stopped smoking it himself.
And while some friends and relatives of the victims discount the possibility that the killings were committed by rival drug dealers, others say it's possible that the three victims were attempting to make bigger drug transactions and could have offended other dealers.
In fact, in January 2011, eight months before the triple homicide, Boston police searched a Roslindale apartment where Weissman was living and seized more than $21,000 in cash, along with a drug ledger, a currency counter, digital scales, and a wide assortment of drugs, including marijuana, hashish, cocaine, and Oxycontin.
Weissman also was a partner in a small business called Hitman Glass, which manufactured and sold glass bongs used to smoke marijuana, according to a Facebook remembrance page, interviews, and public records. The bongs are available at local stores where pipes used to smoke marijuana are sold. In addition, one friend of the victims said that Mess was considering investing in an illegal marijuana-growing business.
Nevertheless, several friends of the victims noted that each of them had been selling drugs for years and could only recall one episode of violence: Mess was once severely beaten after coming up short in a payment to a drug supplier.
"They had all been [selling drugs] peacefully for a long time without a problem," one friend said.
But what stands out for friends of the victims struggling to make sense of the possibility that Tsarnaev and Todashev were the killers is the friendship shared by Mess and Tsarnaev. The two young men grew up in the same Cambridge neighborhood, attended the same high school, and often worked out together.
"They loved each other," one friend said. "It just doesn't add up."
Bob Hohler of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Michael Rezendes can be reached at rezendes@
globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @RezGlobe.


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In the MySQL interface there is no way to abort a query when part way through it. When any of the iterations above stops before reaching its end, the underlying code retrieves all the records to the end of the query (though without converting them to Lisp objects). If the query found many records, that may be an expensive (that is, time consuming) operation.
It is possible to avoid this inefficiency by passing the argument not-inside-transaction . If not-inside-transaction is true then when a query is aborted, then LispWorks closes the database connection and reopens it, rather than retrieving all the remaining records.
(sql:map-query nil 'print
"select forname,surname from people"
:get-all t
:not-inside-transaction t)
Note that this will lose any state associated with the connection, and so not-inside-transaction should only be used with care.


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Bomar's A-lign™ Connectors Ensure Integrity of Connections in Compact Wireless Applications
December 8, 2009
ELECTRONICS: Bomar Interconnect Products Inc. has announced the release of the A-lignTM Series of multi-port MMCX antenna RF connectors. Initially consisting of three- and six-port parts, the proprietary A-lign Series is engineered to support the wireless sector's demand for increasingly smaller consumer, industrial and commercial products. Designed for high-density, cable-to-board applications, the 5.00 mm (1.97 inch) centerline parts provide OEMs/ODMs with the ultimate solution for ensuring the integrity of coaxial cable connections, especially where PCBs are stacked. Moreover, their employment reduces manufacturers' BOM while optimizing close proximity alignment to help speed products' time-to-market. The A-lign Series meets or exceeds all industry mechanical, electrical, and environmental standards.
These PCB mount coaxial interconnects are ideally suited for the broadest range of compact, high-density wireless applications in which package size and high performance are critical factors. They are most frequently specified in cellular base stations, test and measurement equipment and medical equipment. Both male and female devices are provided with snap-together coupling to facilitate low RF leakage and ease of assembly. Female parts featuring Bomar's E-SnapTM PC mounting technology are optionally available. These connectors notably do not require an adhesive prior to reflow soldering as they "snap" securely into previously solder-pasted holes for reflow soldering.
Devices feature a 50-ohm impedance and repeatable performance to 6 GHz. A-Lign interconnects are manufactured of precision-machined brass with gold bodies to support an extremely low reflection factor with a VSWR of 1.30. Female interconnects are provided with gold-plated, beryllium/copper contacts. All parts are supplied with a Teflon dielectric to facilitate a low dielectric constant and for reflow soldering. While interconnects are supplied standard with 5.00 mm centerlines, custom centerline dimensions are accommodated.
In quantities of 1000, pricing for Bomar's three-port female connector is $8.40 each, while the male version is priced at $9.28. Delivery is from stock to 12 weeks. Samples are available upon request.
- Edited by Liz Taurasi
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There is a folder that is owned by user tomcat6:
drwxr-xr-x 2 tomcat6 tomcat6 69632 2011-05-06 03:43 document
I want to allow another user (ruser) write permissions on document folder. The two users (tomcat6 and ruser) does not belong to same group. I have tried using setfacl
sudo setfacl -m u:ruser:rwx document
but this gives me setfacl: document: Operation not supported
error. Kindly help me.


text: So, is programming an art form? We all know everyone writes their programs differently, with different comments, different approaches, and different compilers. When it comes down to it, though, we're really just trying to accomplish the task at hand as efficiently and perfectly as possible. So: Programming - purely technical field, perfectly artistic, or a mix?


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Nearing a year since taking a leave of absence from Little Feat to treat his Hepatitis C, Paul Barrere has remained as busy as he is physically able. Sporadic two-date outings throughout the U.S. with longtime Feat cohort Fred Tackett, as well ongoing recordings with songwriter/producer Roger Cole, have kept the guitarist active in spite of his time away from the group. On the verge of its 45th anniversary, with a biography of the band, Warner Bros. box set, and annual trip to Jamaica putting Little Feat back under the microscope, we talked with Barrere about his current health, plans to perform in 2014, and his future with the acclaimed Southern California sextet.
How are you feeling?
I've just completed eighth week of the Hep C treatment. The two-pill treatment. I'm taking this new Sovaldi and Ribavirin. No Interferon. My eight-week blood work came back and my doctor was so excited he called me personally to tell me there was no sign of any virus at all in my blood. So, the Sovaldi is working. I'm pleased. He's pleased. We're going to continue through the 24 weeks, and then hopefully after I stop taking treatment, the results will remain the same and I'll be back to having a little more energy, a more productive life nearing retirement age.
That's great news, but is it still too early to tell?
That's the big question; once you stop taking the drugs, does it come back? You just never know until time goes by.
You made the decision to share updates of your health on social media, keeping the fans informed of your progress. What made you decide to do that?
My whole theory was this is something I've known about since 1994, and I've had and had managed to survive all these years without having to go through treatment. For the past four years I've been seen by the Pflegler liver clinic at UCLA, monitoring it very closely because it started to progress as I got older. It seems to create more damage to the liver. I knew eventually I was going to get off the road and deal with this. Partially, it was to let people know the reason behind my choice to get off the road, and partially because I've never hidden the fact that in my youth I was pretty crazy. I made some bad choices, although they seemed like a lot of fun at the time. (Laughs)
It also raises awareness, I would imagine.
What I've learned over these 20-some years now about Hep C is that there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people walking around from my generation with the virus in them that they didn't even know about. My objective was to let people know that, if treated, you have a pretty good chance. What was the line that Col. Bruce Hampton had? 'If I had a bazooka at the Battle of Hastings, I could've lived to full adulthood.' It wasn't in the public eye, and I thought maybe it is time it is. If I could help one person, great.
I've read with Hep C it's difficult to pinpoint from where and what source a person contracts it?
I'm pretty sure I got mine from drug use.
We are in the midst of so many rock musicians, from Phil Lesh to Paul McCartney, still performing in their seventies. Or bands like the Allman Brothers and Little Feat celebrating 45th anniversaries this year. Did your role models growing up give you any sense that you'd be doing this into your sixties and seventies?
Oh, yeah. Absolutely. The kind of music that I've made over my entire life, including Little Feat and not including Little Feat, has always been blues-oriented. It was easy for me to see someone like John Lee Hooker or Muddy Waters, who were getting older. Mississippi John Hurt wasn't even discovered until he was 64. I see no problem with doing the old folks boogie sitting down. I enjoy performing, that part of it I'll continue to do until I keel over.
When you were joining Little Feat in 1972, fresh out of Hollywood High School, were you thinking about playing until you keeled over?
Back then I thought I'd keel over a lot sooner. (Laughs) Just because of my lifestyle. It was definitely live fast, live hard, rock out. It wasn't until I was in my thirties and got clean that I realized this is something you can do forever. When you are in your twenties, you don't think about getting into your forties, fifties, and sixties. It's the furthest thing from your mind. You've seen Fred and me work. It's like an old blues artist. You can just sit, play songs, tell stories. The stories keep growing, so it's great.
So the Paul and Fred shows seem more appropriate for you at this time in your life?
Absolutely. It's easier on my physical well-being, and on my psyche not having to travel for long periods of time. I spent the better part of the last 23 years away from home. My son is going to be 25 in June. I missed a lot of his life, my two daughters' lives. I've never seen anyone graduate. To me it seemed like, 'You are battling this virus. You have an opportunity to be home. Take advantage of it.' Since last March, that's pretty much what I've done, and it's been wonderful. It's crazy. Lord knows I have a new appreciation for my wife. It's really nice reconnecting with the family.
You announced that you would not be joining the band in Jamaica for its annual week-long excursion. What led to that decision?
There are a number of things that can go wrong, and if they go wrong, it can go very badly. Between my doctors and myself, we thought it was better that I don't go to a Third World country.
What about stateside? Any plans at the moment to perform with the band after Jamaica?
As I've told everybody in the band, I don't see myself going out doing week-long road trips. I just don't feel up for it. If they want to continue on as Little Feat without me, that's fine and dandy. Hell, we replaced Lowell. We replaced Richie. I'm sure they could replace me. It's not something where I feel like I'm the only piece of Little Feat that means anything, that's for sure. It's always been a band.
Has that reached a level of formal discussion, the notion of them performing without you after Jamaica?
Billy (Payne) mentioned since they are going down to do this thing with the Ramble band, that it might be something they are considering taking on the road. Whether or not that happens, I don't know.
Have there been any talks about a Little Feat concert recognizing the 45th anniversary of the band? Maybe a Los Angeles show or special event that you could be a part of?
There's been no discussion about it. I didn't even know it was the 45th year. (Laughs) Oh, 45, wow. I never, ever close the door on anything. Quite frankly, when you are doing the road thing of one-nighters- you do the show, you get on the bus, maybe sleep a couple of hours, wake up, get a hotel room, if you're lucky get a late check-out, if not you're screwed- you never catch up. That's why it is easy with Fred and me. We can do the show, go back to the hotel and sleep, the next show is a short drive, and then fly home. Everything has to balance because, you know, I'd like to see 75.
So, you will continue to perform Paul and Fred shows throughout 2014?
Yeah. They're ongoing because it's really simple and easy.
Just to clarify; you're not saying you're tired of Little Feat. You're saying the physical toll Little Feat exacts is not something you can afford at the moment. Is that fair?
That's a fair statement.


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Rascal Flatts and Journey Close 2012 CMT Music Awards With 'Don't Stop Believin"
The 2012 CMT Music Awards began with a batch of country and pop collaborations before settling into a Nashville-based broadcast, featuring Music City's best. Rascal Flatts closed the show with one of the all-time greatest mainstream rock bands however, inviting Journey on stage to sing 'Don't Stop Believin'.'
Prior to the show, Gary LeVox, Joe Don Rooney and Jay DeMarcus talked about how big of a treat it was to be taking the stage with their boyhood idols. One need not look further than Rooney's V-shaped guitar to see the 80s influence. These days, Arnel Pineda fronts the rock group instead of Steve Perry, but the sound is mostly the same due to Neal Schon's guitar work. Fans were treated to a long solo halfway through the song.
Artists like Jake Owen loved it. He was seen on multiple occasions singing along with his new bride Lacey Buchanan.
Toby Keith introduced the Flatts, who began their performance by singing their recent hit song 'Banjo.' Ashley Campbell was featured heavily during the song. She was the blonde in the red mini-dress that spent so much time on camera. She's also the daughter of Glen Campbell.
As the credits rolled, a hail storm of sparks fell from the roof of the Bridgestone Arena. It's possible that the crowd may still be cheering.
Watch Rascal Flatts and Journey Perform at the 2012 CMT Music Awards


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UPDATE (June 14, 2013): Stephen's LEGO Curiosity Rover will be the next LEGO CUUSOO set!
The Brothers Brick has featured the Mars Rover Curiosity CUUSOO project before as one of the more original and stand out projects on LEGO CUUSOO right now. But here is a surprising factoid, the creator of this model, Stephen Pakbaz, aka Perijove, was an actual engineer for Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and worked on designing the very same Mars Rover in real life! The Brothers Brick decided to interview Stephen.
TBB: Tell us about your background?
Perijove: I received my Bachelors Degree at the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Terre Haute, Indiana, majoring in Mechanical Engineering with a concentration in Aerospace and a minor in Electrical Engineering, and then a Masters Degree in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at UC San Diego in California.
TBB: What was your position at Jet Propulsion Laboratory?
Perijove: My position at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory was a Mechanical Engineer in the Structures and Configurations Group. I also sometimes took on the responsibilities of a Cognizant Engineer.
TBB: Can you tell us about your work on the Curiosity Rover?
Perijove: The Curiosity rover was the first spacecraft I ever worked on after I finished with school in 2007. Even back then, the rover development was well underway, but there was still a lot of design, assembly, and testing left to do. I took part in all of these activities. I designed parts like brackets and covers and was responsible for their development all the way through delivering them to the technicians that would put them on the rover. Other tasks included writing procedures, assembling, and testing things like telecommunications systems and antennas. Types of testing included vibration, shock, and thermal-vacuum to simulate the different environments that would be experienced by the rover. One particularly fun test was bolting an engineering model of Curiosity to a 50 foot diameter centrifuge and spinning it up to over 20 g's in order to simulate the forces the rover would experience during entry into the Martian atmosphere.
TBB: How long have you been a Lego enthusiast?
Perijove: I have been a LEGO enthusiast since at least elementary school. My own collection, at the time, was mostly pieces like simple bricks and wheels, but I would often play with friends and their collections too.
TBB: What experience did you have with Lego as a kid?
Perijove: My collection began to include more complex pieces just before middle school. I mostly built minifigure-sized robots and spaceships. Play scenarios often including using all my pieces to build a massive spaceship to move my entire minifigure population to another habitable planet before their current one was destroyed by a huge asteroid or a rogue robot. (Wow, that just brought on some powerful nostalgia!)
TBB: Did LEGO play a role in your chosen career path?
Perijove: LEGO absolutely had an impact on my career path. In high school, I spent much of my free time designing things like manned missions to the moons of Jupiter in graph paper notebooks. I often drew the designs with LEGO pieces so I could eventually create real models. This was also a great way to learn everything I could about space travel from interesting destinations and past missions to new forms of propulsion and radiation protection. LEGO has also been a great tool for quickly making quick prototypes of various mechanisms and other ideas to see how they worked.
TBB: What were your favorite sets/ themes as a child?
Perijove: Most of the space themes, of course, were my favorite, like M-Tron, Ice-Planet 2002, Exploriens, Roboforce, etc. Technic and Trains were great too, but those kinds of sets were often too expensive for me. I would have to say one of my favorite sets was 6338 Shuttle Launch Pad.
TBB: Did you ever experience a dark age?
Perijove: I never experienced a total dark age, but more like a dim age, while I was at school in Indiana. I couldn't bring my entire collection with me form California, but I did manage to keep a few choice models and pieces with me. During this time, I also satisfied my LEGO habit as a volunteer and mentor for kids in the First LEGO League, a popular nationwide LEGO robotics competition. I had a lot of fun teaching kids about the mechanical possibilities of LEGO and seeing their robots compete and cooperate with eachother.
TBB: Did having first hand experience on the real Curiosity help with the design of the Lego version?
Perijove: I learn best by seeing and touching, which perhaps explains my affinity for mechanical engineering and LEGO. The rocker-bogie suspension system on the rover was just so cool, that I needed to make a LEGO version that I could play with. Being so close to the real rover all the time, designing a few small parts for it, and working with larger assemblies certainly helped me to understand its features, what they did, and how they worked. I'm hoping the LEGO Curiosity rover does the same for others.
TBB: Did you follow the progress of the rover's trip to Mars?
Perijove: I kept up on every piece of information about the rover that was available to me. This was the first project where I was finally able to put my years of engineering education to use, so I really wanted it to be successful. I saw the landing live and ate plenty of peanuts beforehand for good luck, a tradition at JPL before critical mission events.
TBB: How did you feel about the landing?
Perijove: The landing itself was a conflicting conflagration of emotion. In my mind, I was confident of the success of the landing. My heart and other organs were filled with excitement, fear, nervousness, anticipation and, of course, curiosity. I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep afterwards and spent that time calming down, talking to family and friends, and watching all the events that happened shortly afterwards.
TBB: Any thoughts about the historical significance of this achievement?
Perijove: The landing itself was quite historic. The ability to land such a large payload so precisely will be extremely important to future efforts. Though it's still too early to be sure of the historical significance of the scientific returns of the mission, I'm sure it will be something wonderful. As for the significance of my own involvement, I think it's kind of cool to think that long after the Great Pyramids on Earth have perished over time, it is possible that the rover I worked on will still be preserved on Mars (unless, of course, it becomes a victim of space looters).


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It's just a few days before the Greek parliamentary elections, and the whole world is watching this small corner of Europe with bated breath. Stress captures the markets, Brussels, and Berlin as statements by top European officials indicate the possibility of an undesirable political outcome on Sunday.
One after the other, politicians such as Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Manuel Barroso and technocrats such as IMF head Christine Lagarde underline the need for Greece to comply with the bailout programme or face the consequences of a possible cancellation of the financial support, something that could result in a Greek exit from the eurozone.
However, the Greek elections' outcome is not the most important issue at stake. At the moment, a coalition government seems to be the more likely scenario, whether conservative New Democracy or progressive Syriza finishes first. Any coalition is by its very nature an affair of compromises – therefore, no matter how hard the lines of the political parties, the next Greek government will probably be a little more moderate. And even if Syriza manages to form a government of its own, it has repeatedly stated that it will seek for solutions in the European context.
So, are the Greek elections overestimated or unworthy of this extraordinary attention they're having? Absolutely not. The repercussions of June 17 will be of historical importance for Greece, and they will have a great impact on European politics as well.
A radical left party leading a coalition government in a small country in the European periphery might not mean much for decision-making in Brussels and Berlin, but it could provide a strong paradigm for all those on the continent who are suffering the consequences of neoliberal orthodoxy and its mantra: austerity. As Aristides Baltas, a Greek philosophy professor at the University of Athens wrote in an article published in the Greek press: "Politics is not just knowing how to walk down a path. Indeed it is also to understand that every step you take opens new paths and possibilities and walk in that spirit."
A leftist victory might also inspire the young, highly educated, but unemployed demonstrating in the squares of Rome, Lisbon, Dublin and Madrid. Would they then see that they could create politics in a way that includes them and not just tolerate them in a passive manner? Or that the economy is a political issue par excellence? That is the true importance of Syriza's possible victory in Greece – a victory that would be against all odds.
The wrong narrative
A few days ago, Spain, one of the largest European economies, agreed to a 100bn euro ($125.5bn) bailout to recapitalise its banks. The bailout will require the country to sign a memorandum with the lenders, which includes supervision by the IMF. To all those who doubted the validity of the narrative that the corrupt Greek public sector caused the crisis, this news is not surprising at all.
A structural European economic and political problem needs to be addressed as such, and cannot be contained within a miserably functionalist interpretation that blames a small part of the machine for the malfunction of the whole system. Back in 2009, public debt had already become a European issue, with almost all countries presenting growing numbers and many European banks exposed to debt to an extent that seemed unsustainable. Today, almost half of the eurozone countries are in economic trouble, despite the fact that the Greek economy took the medicine of internal devaluation by deregulating the labor market, slashing pensions and wages, and reducing public spending.
Not only has the rescue plan proven to be a total failure for Greece, but the "disease" is spreading rapidly throughout the continent. If the troika and the conservatives in Europe were correct, then contagion would not be such a big problem: financial "firewalls" would work and ejecting Greece would be a sustainable solution for the eurozone.
But with half of the European periphery in trouble, everybody has serious considerations for the validity of the rescue that has been exercised so far. Still, the elites insist to remain on course, putting economies such as Spain, Italy and even the euro itself at great risk. In their persistence, they don't hesitate to intervene in the democratic process of sovereign states, turning this partly into a political crisis as well.
In Greece, the political system that ran the country for 37 years collapsed like a house of cards. But the troika is openly promoting its favourite candidates, the parties that created this mess (PASOK and New Democracy), and some of its members are issuing warnings that if other parties are elected, there could be serious consequences. Looking at it from the point of view of an ordinary Greek, this translates more or less as follows: "Support the corrupt, inadequate forces that ruined your life or suffer the consequences." In one word: Blackmail.
Hope against fear
Blackmail has been the tool used since the beginning of this crisis, and it has caused a series of dangerous distortions in the political and social fields that Greece will probably have to cope with for quite some time. The supporters of the memorandum, the two ruling parties, used it in order to target workers' rights and the left by accusing them of being lazy, corrupt and irresponsible.
For the past two years, going on strike was considered to be a sin against the national economy and was heavily criticised in the media every other night. The famous dictum "we all partied" was etched into the public conscience as collective guilt. And the left, though marginal back then, was attacked in an effort to construct a scapegoat, for defending established social rights within the liberal democratic context. In this narrative, Greece was the last Soviet economy, the crisis was a national security issue, and the government's main job was to impose order both in the economy and society. However, the intensity of the attack on workers' rights, the extreme rise of unemployment and of poverty and suicide rates left no room for consent with the austerity program. The left's repeatedly confirmed criticism of the crisis' causes and its ability to grasp the signs in society and translate them into political discourse worked triumphantly in its favour.
That ignited a second wave of attacks, this time against immigrants and against the left, only this time in ideological and historical terms. The adoption of the extreme right-wing agenda by PASOK and New Democracy in regards to immigrants' rights raised questions of whether Greece is capable of respecting human rights or not. And again, it's the left that defends these values against the "responsible" forces of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the European conservatives.
But the conservatives in Greece took it even further by adopting militant ideological rhetoric against the "communist danger", which sounds like the rhetoric that the right was using during the Greek civil war back in the 1940s. The left responded with a Keynesian economic program, a denouncement of corruption and the clientelist state, and a discourse that defends democracy as a value. By all means, what is happening today in Greece is a struggle between fear and hope.
The romanticism of democracy
A couple of weeks ago, the head of the IMF, Christine Lagarde, ironically stated that she had no sympathy for the Greeks, and that she was more concerned about the children in Niger than the people of Greece who – according to her – should start paying their taxes if they want to get out of this mess. Online social networks were immediately flooded with angry comments against her: "If Christine Lagarde is thinking of implementing to Greece the same programme she's introduced to the Niger in Africa, then it might be better for us if we just didn't have the pleasure of her sympathy," wrote one Greek Twitter user.
The wave of criticism wasn't just due to Christine Lagarde's inability to show empathy with a people who are trying to pull themselves together in a difficult moment of their history. But the criticism also targeted the IMF and its policies which destroy social cohesion and damage democratic procedures wherever they have been implemented so far. What, if not democracy and social consent, are the necessary pre-conditions for any country to emerge from its misery? For many in Europe, Lagarde's sentiment reflects the cynicism of the elites who are dealing with the economic crisis in a technocratic, inhumane manner that recognises numbers in stock markets but fails to see real people jumping into the abyss of despair.
Returning to the election, Syriza's victory on Sunday – though quite possible – is not the most important thing. The most important thing is Syriza's struggle for the restoration of politics as the primary field of decision-making and democracy, as opposed to technocracy. This is the romantic aspect of its struggle, and as such, it is not limiting itself to change in Greece – but also in Europe at large. As Syriza has managed to come to this point against all odds, we will soon see whether this romanticism is naive or truly essential.
This article first appeared on Al-Jazeera and Common Dreams.


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If you were asked what station is currently orbiting 400 km above the Earth at 28 000 km/h you may be tempted to answer the International Space Station (ISS). This is of course correct but if you were to look with a good telescope behind the ISS (or tune in with the appropriate equipment) you may soon pick up a second station: a radio station.
On Friday 3 February, at 23:20 Central European Time the ISS Crew of Valery Tokarev and William McArthur are due to start an EVA from the Pirs airlock of the Russian section of the ISS wearing Russian Orlan space suits. However, a third Orlan spacesuit will be on the spacewalk with them, one that is nearing the end of its useful life. The plan is literally to throw the extra spacesuit overboard. This may not present an obvious link to radio stations but this suit is fitted with amateur radio equipment, which will transmit messages in many different languages during its time in orbit.
The spacesuit with equipment is called Suitsat-1 (also called Radio Sputnik or Radioskaf in Russian). SuitSat is a project sponsored by ARISS (Amateur Radio on the ISS) an international working group of volunteers from national amateur radio organisations. ARISS has been used as an integral part of education activities within ESA Human Spaceflight missions with the aim of developing children's interest in space and science in general.
These activities have allowed many school children the opportunity to have radio contact with a European astronaut on the International Space Station including contact with the last three European astronauts on the ISS, Roberto Vittori, André Kuipers and Pedro Duque. ESA astronaut Thomas Reiter will also take part in an ARISS contact with schools as part of the six-month Astrolab mission, which is due to be launched to the ISS on the next Shuttle mission.
15 minutes after Tokarev launches Suitsat-1 away from the back of the ISS the transmitter will be activated. Suitsat will then be transmitting recorded radio messages, mainly from students from Europe (in German and Spanish), Canada (in French) the United States (in English) and Russia and Japan in the respective languages. These are the five ARISS regions. The recording lasts about eight minutes with each broadcast. Several of the student messages include a special or confidential word for listeners to discover, as part of one of the student projects for SuitSat.
The object is for participants tuning in to the transmission to figure out the special word in each language, copy them down and submit them to the ARISS team for special educational award recognition. Russian generated messages include congratulatory comments to the Bauman Moscow State Technical University where most of the engineers of the Russian Federal Space Agency, and Russian research institutions and industry have graduated. The congratulatory comments act as an on-orbit commemoration of the 175th anniversary of the university.
An integrated voice synthesizer will be used for transmitting additional information in English about battery voltage, onboard temperature and elapsed time since launch in English and Slow Scan Television images will be provided. Transmissions can be picked up on 145.990 MHz FM for about a week until the batteries are empty. These transmissions will also be relayed via the ISS onboard station NA1SS on 437.800 MHz FM. However, Suitsat will remain in orbit around the Earth for up to six weeks until it burns up on entry into Earth's atmosphere.
Those who pick up the transmissions from Suitsat can enter their data on the SuitSat website, http://www.suitsat.org so that participants around the world can track the satellite. Educational Outreach reports (at schools or informal education sites) as well as Slow Scan TV images can be sent to [email protected]. This information will be compiled by the ARISS team.
In addition to the slow jettison of Suitsat away from the station early during the spacewalk, the six-hour EVA will include: relocation of a boom adapter for the Strela robotic arm on the Pirs docking module of the Russian section of the ISS; insertion of a bolt on the mobile transporter of the Canadarm robotic arm, to avoid the repetition of the inadvertent cutting of an intact power, data and video cable, as occurred with a second cable in December; retrieval of the Biorisk experiment, a study on microorganisms in space; retrieval of a panel from the Kromka experiment; and photography of various external areas of the ISS. This will be Tokarev's second spacewalk and McArthur's fourth.
From European Space Agency


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Make clear to them that they are to put themselves under rulers and authorities, to do what they are ordered, to be ready for every good work,
To say no evil of any man, not to be fighters, to give way to others, to be gentle in behaviour to all men.
For in the past we were foolish, hard in heart, turned from the true way, servants of evil desires and pleasures, living in bad feeling and envy, hated and hating one another.
But when the mercy of God our Saviour, and his love to man was seen,
Not by works of righteousness which we did ourselves, but in the measure of his mercy, he gave us salvation, through the washing of the new birth and the giving of new life in the Holy Spirit,
Which he gave us freely through Jesus Christ our Saviour;
So that, having been given righteousness through grace, we might have a part in the heritage, the hope of eternal life.
This is a true saying; and it is my desire that you may give certain witness about these things, so that those who have had faith in God may give attention to good works. These things are good and of profit to men;
But have nothing to do with foolish questionings, and lists of generations, and fights and arguments about the law; for they are of no profit and foolish.
A man whose opinions are not those of the church, after a first and second protest, is to be kept out of your society;
Clearly he is in error and a sinner, being self-judged.
When I send Artemas or Tychicus to you, do your best to come to me at Nicopolis: for it is my purpose to be there for the winter.
Send Zenas, the man of law, and Apollos on their journey with all care, so that they may be in need of nothing.
And let our people go on with good works for necessary purposes, so that they may not be without fruit.
All who are with me send you their love. Give our love to our friends in the faith. Grace be with you all.


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You will have to click on the image, and then enlarge (ctrl +) a couple of times to read the text--please do.
And isn't Iowa photographer Ruth Ratliff's photo of the barn with the wildflowers stunning? Ruth is an amazing woman who loves photographing barn quilts and has lent her artwork to both the book and my calendar. So pleased that her work will be published here!
I feel like a kid at Christmas--wonder what it will be like when the actual book arrives??


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Freshly retooled, featuring smoother lines and even better ergonomics
Water Volume:
370 US Gallons / 1440 litres
Height: 98cm / 39″ / 3′
Width: 235cm / 93″ / 8′
Length: 235cm / 93″ / 8′
Seats: 4
Lounger: 1
Capacity: 6
We proudly announce the return of the legendary Mustang.
Featuring smoother lines and even better ergonomics.
Relax in the spacious lounger or lean back with an invigorating massage in a fantastic therapy seat. Big enough for the family, luxury for all.
Platinum Swirl
*Models displayed are representative of colors ONLY and may not be the model described.
Designers Corner
Check out the technical specifications of this model:
Standard Features
Arctic Spas® come with a range of features as standard!
Click any of the features below to find out more about them!
Optional Features
The ability to customize an Arctic Spas® is one of the best features of the brand.
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Brothers Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss — famed for their dispute with Mark Zuckerberg over the formation of Facebook — are trying their hand at the social media space again. They have invested US$1 million in SumZero, a social networking site founded in 2008 by fellow Harvard alum Divya Narendra, who also had a hand in bringing Facebook to life.
The Winklevoss twins sued Zuckerberg, alleging he stole the concept of Facebook from them. Narendra supported the twins in that legal battle, which was eventually settled out of court.
Now the three are collaborating again, although SumZero has little in common with Facebook beyond the fact that they are both social networking sites. SumZero is a professional network for hedge fund, mutual fund and private equity executives. It aims to facilitate contacts among its members, including the sharing of research and thought leadership papers.
The site boasts that nearly every well-known fund is a member, including Greenlight, Pershing Square, and Weiss Asset Management.
A New Model
SumZero represents a variation on the social networking theme, said Trip Chowdhry, managing director of equity research at Global Equities Research.
While Facebook and other sites of its ilk aim to be all things to all people, vertical sites such as SumZero target select groups of people, he told the E-Commerce Times.
LinkedIn follows this model with its focus on solely on professional ties. Other sites focus on specific verticals or industries; a number of them have proliferated in the health information space, for example.
SumZero stands out in that it has been successful in maintaining itself via a subscription model. It charges $129 per month for the elite membership, a sum that buys two investment ideas each month, live discussions with SumZero hedge fund managers, coverage and analysis on certain issues, and other investment-related opportunities.
"We don't like to compare ourselves to traditional social media outlets," Narendra told the E-Commerce Times.
"Rather, SumZero is attempting to use available social media tools to create a whole new type of investment research — that is, buyside research. And unlike traditional social media outlets where the conversation is of very uncertain utility, when you get a large group of very sophisticated professional investors sharing ideas with one another, the end product here is extremely useful."
The $1 million investment will be used for typical growth initiatives, he added, "specifically product development and finding talented people to grow our team."
The Vision Thing
It is not surprising that the Winklevoss twins are backing this model, as experimental as it is, Chowdhry said.
"These two brothers were the vision behind Facebook, while the implementation was done by Mark Zuckerberg," he said. "People will disagree with that statement, but that is the converged opinion about Facebook's origins."
What the twins brought to the table, in other words, cannot be stolen, copied or communicated. For that reason Chowdhry is betting that they identify the next social media trend — for indeed, there will be a next one.
"Friendster was dethroned by MySpace, and Facebook dethroned MySpace," he pointed out. "Facebook is a solid and enduring site, but there is room for others as well."


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One of the biggest questions we've gotten in the last few years is "When are you going to make a Ratchet & Clank movie?" The truth is, we've wanted to do a movie for a long time! Ratchet & Clank's action, humor and galaxy-spanning adventures have really been the basis for a fantastic game series, and we think it'd translate perfectly to the big screen.
We've been looking for the right partner to help us bring a Ratchet & Clank movie to life, and we're thrilled to announce that Blockade Entertainment and Rainmaker Entertainment are currently in production on Ratchet & Clank's first cinematic adventure.
I wish they would of done this years ago.
Hopefully Sony Create a DC type Universe Movie, for there games.
Jak & D
Resistance etc....
Omg this is a really smart move from there part. It will honestly introduce new people to the games. Have a 4 yr old nephew that will totally see this since he can't really get into the games at the moment. But can't lie that I'm quite psyched myself. I agree with Braided that they should do it to other CGI looking franchises like Sly Cooper for example.


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Facebook-owned messaging platform WhatsApp has unveiled plans to develop standalone versions of its mobile app aimed at connecting businesses and their customers more easily.
WhatsApp Business will be free for small businesses, with a paid-for enterprise version targeted at those with a global customer base – an indication of one way Facebook plans to monetize the app, which now has a billion daily users.
In a blog post Tuesday, the company said the proposed enterprise app will allow large organizations including airlines, e-commerce sites, and banks to contact customers with notifications, such as "flight times, delivery confirmations, and other updates".
Pricing information was not disclosed, though The Wall Street Journal reported that the corporate tool will be require a fee.
WhatsApp has been steadily enhancing its business-to-consumer capabilities for some time now. Last week, the firm announced a business verification system, with a green badge indicating WhatsApp has confirmed a phone number belongs to an authenticated business account – similar to Facebook's own grey badge for business pages. WhatsApp has previously announced plans to allow businesses to contact customers with marketing messages.
In its blog post, WhatsApp said it will work with business users as part of a closed pilot program to test additional new services ahead of a wider launch.
One of the companies testing the enterprise service, UK-based ecommerce firm Yoox Net-a-Porter, said in a blog post that many of its customers prefer to use WhatsApp rather than email to complete transactions and get product suggestions. The company, which also has operations in the U.S., said it has completed single item sales of up $104,000. WhatsApp is now integrated with its order management system application, and is being tested as a notification system for order shipping confirmations.
The announcement serves to highlight the growing acceptance of the consumer messaging app by business users. WhatsApp claimed that many small businesses are already using its platform to interact with customers, though acknowledged that kind of connection is "pretty rudimentary."
WhatsApp is also increasingly being used in large and small organizations as a collaboration tool for staff. , for example, that doctors in the UK's National Health Service have been using WhatsApp and video messaging tool SnapChat to send sensitive patient information despite a strict ban on such use, while British diplomats apparently use it for confidential discussions – both examples of "shadow IT," where employees side-step outdated systems in favor of modern messaging tools.
The prospect of more widespread use of WhatsApp at work could pose problems for enterprise IT admins because the messaging software is clearly aimed at individual users with no focus yet on corporate security or compliance features.
Even so, there are early signs of functionality that would support business uses. Last year, WhatsApp added document sharing capabilities, for example, allowing users to send and receive files such as PDFs via its app, and it developed desktop clients for Windows and Mac OS.
Facebook also began a more concerted push into business use, with its Workplace social network platform launch at the end of 2016.
Facebook acquired WhatsApp in 2014 for approximately $22 billion, and has been attempting to find ways to generate revenue streams from the popular messaging app.
Source computerworld.in


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Oneok Partners LP plans to build a 100-MMcfd natural gas processing plant, Garden Creek III, and related infrastructure in eastern McKenzie County, ND, in the Williston basin. The company also will build a 95-mile NGL pipeline between existing fractionation systems at Hutchinson, Kan., and Medford, Okla., and modify the Hutchinson site to accommodate lighter, unfractionated NGLs produced in the Williston basin.
Oneok expects the Garden Creek III gas processing plant, including expansions and upgrades to existing gathering systems and compression, to enter service in first-quarter 2015. Oneok will build Garden Creek III near its Garden Creek I gas processing plant and the announced 100-MMcfd Garden Creek II gas processing plant, which is expected to be in service in third-quarter 2014 (OGJ Online, July 27, 2012). The Garden Creek III project will cost $325-360 million.
The partnership's expects its previously announced Stateline II gas processing plant to be in service later this quarter. The combined natural gas processing capacities of the Garden Creek II and III plants, and Stateline II, will bring Oneok's Williston basin total to 590 MMcfd, including its Garden Creek, Stateline I, and Grasslands plants.
Oneok also will invest $140 million to build a 95-mile NGL pipeline connecting its NGL fractionation and storage in Hutchinson, Kan., to similar facilities in Medford, Okla. These investments include modification of the Hutchinson fractionator and are expected to enter service in first-quarter 2015.
Contact Christopher E. Smith at [email protected].


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A brief filed in federal court in Washington is alleging that the Council on American-Islamic Relations is "a criminal organization that deceptively holds itself out to the public as the nation's largest Muslim-American civil rights organization."
The filing is from the American Freedom Law Center, whose co-founder, David Yerushalmi, is representing clients who reportedly sought legal advice from a CAIR representative who was not a lawyer.
The two civil lawsuits were filed earlier alleging that CAIR, which was named by the U.S. Justice Department as an unindicted terrorist co-conspirator, was aware that its "resident attorney" and "manager for civil rights" at a now-defunct Maryland-Virginia Chapter, Morris Days, was not a lawyer and failed to provide legal services for Muslims to came to CAIR for help.
See the inside report on what CAIR's plans in America include.
The complaint alleges CAIR purposefully conspired with Days to keep the clients from discovering that their legal matters were being mishandled or not handled at all, according to Yerushalmi, who is representing several plaintiffs in the argument.
TRENDING: 'The Trump Miracle' is happening – believe it!
When the cases were filed, he said, "CAIR has engaged in a massive criminal fraud in which literally hundreds of CAIR clients have been victimized, and because of the CAIR cover-up, they still don't realize it. The fact that CAIR has victimized Muslims and non-Muslims alike demonstrates that CAIR is only looking out for CAIR and its ongoing effort to bilk donors out of millions of dollars of charitable donations thinking they are supporting a legitimate organization."
The cases are in the federal district court for the District of Columbia. They contend CAIR knew or should have known Days was not a lawyer when it hired him. Further, when CAIR officials were confronted with evidence of Days' fraudulent conduct, the complaints say, they conspired to conceal the fraud.
A new brief filed in the case is supported by hundreds of pages of evidence and is asking the judge to find CAIR liable for fraud, breach of fiduciary duty and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
The AFLC today reported, "The brief and supporting evidence overwhelmingly demonstrate that CAIR was involved in a massive criminal fraud and cover-up that injured numerous client-victims who had looked to CAIR for legal assistance, yet the CAIR 'attorney' allegedly handling their cases was in fact not an attorney."
"The evidence has long suggested that CAIR is an organization set up by the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas to further its aims of stealth jihad in the United States," Yerushalmi said.
Five former CAIR clients filed two lawsuits, which followed an earlier lawsuit in which it was alleged CAIR's activity amounted to racketeering. While the court in that case said the conduct was fraudulent it was not a technical violation of RICO.
Robert Muise, co-counsel in the lawsuit and co-founder and senior counsel of AFLC, commented: "The overwhelming evidence marshaled in this case will finally put to rest the myth fabricated by CAIR's PR machine and perpetrated by a complicit media that this is a legitimate Muslim-American civil rights organization. This lawsuit strips away CAIR's veil of legitimacy."
Rogues gallery of terror-tied CAIR leaders
As former FBI agent Mike Rolf acknowledges in "Muslim Mafia," "CAIR has had a number of people in positions of power within the organization that have been directly connected to terrorism and have either been prosecuted or thrown out of the country." According to another FBI veteran familiar with recent and ongoing cases involving CAIR officials, "Their offices have been a turnstile for terrorists and their supporters."
A review of the public record, including federal criminal court documents, past IRS 990 tax records and Federal Election Commission records detailing donor occupations, reveals that CAIR has been associated with a disturbing number of convicted terrorists or felons in terrorism probes, as well as suspected terrorists and active targets of terrorism investigations. The list is long and includes:
FBI agents arresting CAIR founding director Ghassan Elashi in 2002. |
- Ghassan Elashi: One of CAIR's founding directors, he was convicted in 2004 of illegally shipping high-tech goods to terror state Syria and is serving 80 months in prison. He was also convicted of providing material support to Hamas in the Holy Land Foundation terror-financing trial. He was chairman of the charity, which provided seed capital to CAIR. Elashi is related to Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzook.
- Muthanna al-Hanooti: The CAIR director's home was raided in 2006 by FBI agents in connection with an active terrorism investigation. Agents also searched the offices of his advocacy group, Focus on Advocacy and Advancement of International Relations, which al-Hanooti operates out of Dearborn, Mich., and Washington, D.C.Al-Hanooti, who emigrated to the U.S. from Iraq, formerly helped run a suspected Hamas terror front called LIFE for Relief and Development. Its Michigan offices also were raided in September 2006. In 2004, LIFE's Baghdad office was raided by U.S. troops, who seized files and computers. Al-Hanooti is related to Sheik Mohammed al-Hanooti, an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Muthanna al-Hanooti, wearing traditional headgarb "Al-Hanooti collected over $6 million for support of Hamas," according to a 2001 FBI report, and was present with CAIR and Holy Land officials at a secret Hamas fundraising summit held in 1993 at a Philadelphia hotel. Prosecutors added his name to the list of unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land case.
Although Al-Hanooti denies supporting Hamas, he has praised Palestinian suicide bombers as "martyrs" who are "alive in the eyes of Allah."
- Abdurahman Alamoudi: Another CAIR director, he is serving 23 years in federal prison for plotting terrorism. Alamoudi, who was caught on tape complaining that bin Laden hadn't killed enough Americans in the U.S. embassy bombings in Africa, was one of al-Qaida's top fundraisers in America, according to the U.S. Treasury Department.
- Siraj Wahhaj: A member of CAIR's board of advisers, Wahhaj was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. The radical Brooklyn imam was close to convicted terrorist Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and defended him during his trial.
Imam Siraj Wahhaj "Muslim Mafia," citing co-author's Sperry's previous book "Infiltration" as well as terror expert Steven Emerson's research, reports that Wahhaj, a black convert to Islam, is converting gang members to Islam and holding "jihad camps" for them. With a combination of Islam and Uzis, he has said, the street thugs will be a powerful force for Islam the day America "will crumble."
Wahhaj was a key speaker at CAIR's 15th annual fund-raising banquet in Arlington, Va., in 2009.
- Randall "Ismail" Royer: The former CAIR communications specialist and civil-rights coordinator is serving 20 years in prison in connection with the Virginia Jihad Network, which he led while employed by CAIR at its Washington headquarters. The group trained to kill U.S. soldiers overseas, cased the FBI headquarters and cheered the space shuttle Columbia tragedy. Al-Qaida operative Ahmed Abu Ali, convicted of plotting to assassinate President George W. Bush, was among those who trained with Royer's Northern Virginia cell.
- Bassam Khafagi: Another CAIR official, Khafagi was arrested in 2003 while serving as CAIR's director of community affairs. He pleaded guilty to charges of bank and visa fraud stemming from a federal counter-terror probe of his leadership role in the Islamic Assembly of North America, which has supported al-Qaida and advocated suicide attacks on America. He was sentenced to 10 months in prison and deported to his native Egypt.
- Laura Jaghlit: A civil-rights coordinator for CAIR, her Washington-area home was raided by federal agents after 9/11 as part of an investigation into terrorist financing, money laundering and tax fraud. Her husband Mohammed Jaghlit, a key leader in the Saudi-backed SAAR network, is a target of the still-active probe.Jaghlit sent two letters accompanying donations – one for $10,000, the other for $5,000 – from the SAAR Foundation to Sami al-Arian, now a convicted terrorist. In each letter, according to a federal affidavit, "Jaghlit instructed al-Arian not to disclose the contribution publicly or to the media."Investigators suspect the funds were intended for Palestinian terrorists via a U.S. front called WISE, which at the time employed an official who personally delivered a satellite phone battery to Osama bin Laden. The same official also worked for Jaghlit's group.In addition, Jaghlit donated a total of $37,200 to the Holy Land Foundation, which prosecutors say is a Hamas front. Jaghlit subsequently was named an unindicted co-conspirator in the case.
Nihad Awa |
- Nihad Awad: Wiretap evidence from the Holy Land case puts CAIR's executive director at the Philadelphia meeting of Hamas leaders and activists in 1993 that was secretly recorded by the FBI. Participants hatched a plot to disguise payments to Hamas terrorists as charitable giving.During the meeting, according to FBI transcripts, Awad was recorded discussing the propaganda effort. He mentions Ghassan Dahduli, whom he worked with at the time at the Islamic Association for Palestine, another Hamas front. Both were IAP officers. Dahduli's name also was listed in the address book of bin Laden's personal secretary, Wadi al-Hage, who is serving a life sentence in prison for his role in the U.S. embassy bombings. Dahduli, an ethnic-Palestinian like Awad, was deported to Jordan after 9/11 for refusing to cooperate in the terror investigation. (An April 28, 2009, letter from FBI assistant director Richard C. Powers to Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz. – which singles out CAIR chief Awad for suspicion – explains how the group's many Hamas connections caused the FBI to sever ties with CAIR.)Awad's and Dahduli's phone numbers are listed in a Muslim Brotherhood document seized by federal investigators revealing "important phone numbers" for the "Palestine Section" of the Brotherhood in America. The court exhibit showed Hamas fugitive Mousa Abu Marzook listed on the same page with Awad.
Omar Ahmad
- Omar Ahmad: U.S. prosecutors also named CAIR's founder and chairman emeritus as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land case. Ahmad, too, was placed at the Philadelphia meeting, FBI special agent Lara Burns testified at the trial. Prosecutors also designated him as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood's "Palestine Committee" in America. Ahmad, like his CAIR partner Awad, is ethnic-Palestinian.(Though both Ahmad and Awad were senior leaders of IAP, the Hamas front, neither of their biographical sketches posted on CAIR's website mentions their IAP past.)
Nabil Sadoun
- Nabil Sadoun: A CAIR board member, Sadoun has served on the board of the United Association for Studies and Research, which investigators believe to be a key Hamas front in America. In fact, Sadoun co-founded UASR with Hamas leader Marzook. The Justice Department added UASR to the list of unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land case. UPDATE: In 2010, Sadoun was ordered deported to his native Jordan. An immigration judge referenced Sadoun's relationship with Hamas and the Holy Land Foundation during a deportation hearing.
- Mohamed Nimer: CAIR's research director also served as a board director for UASR, the strategic arm for Hamas in the U.S. CAIR neglects to mention Nimer's and Sadoun's roles in UASR in their bios.
Mohamed Nimer
- Rafeeq Jaber: A founding director of CAIR, Jaber was the long-time president of the Islamic Association for Palestine. In 2002, a federal judge found that "the Islamic Association for Palestine has acted in support of Hamas." In his capacity as IAP chief, Jaber praised Hezbollah attacks on Israel. He also served on the board of a radical mosque in the Chicago area.
- Rabith Hadid: The CAIR fundraiser was a founder of the Global Relief Foundation, which after 9/11 was blacklisted by the Treasury Department for financing al-Qaida and other terror groups. Its assets were frozen in December 2001. Hadid was arrested on terror-related charges and deported to Lebanon in 2003.
- Hamza Yusuf: The FBI investigated the CAIR board member after 9/11, because just two days before the attacks, he made an ominous prediction to a Muslim audience."This country is facing a terrible fate, and the reason for that is because this country stands condemned," Yusuf warned. "It stands condemned like Europe stood condemned because of what it did. And lest people forget, Europe suffered two world wars after conquering the Muslim lands."
CAIR's founder Ahmad, while claiming to be a moderate and patriotic American, reportedly told a group of Muslims in Northern California in 1998 that they are in America not to assimilate, but to help assert Islam's rule over the country.
"Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant," a local reporter paraphrased him as saying. "The Quran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth."
Ahmad insists he was misquoted. However, the reporter stands by her story, and an FBI wiretap transcript quotes Ahmad agreeing with terrorist suspects gathered at the secret Philadelphia meeting to "camouflage" their true intentions.
He compared it to the head fake in basketball.
"This is like one who plays basketball: He makes a player believe that he is doing this, while he does something else," Ahmad said. "I agree with you. Like they say, politics is a completion of war."
Hooper, CAIR's communications director, also has expressed a desire to overturn the U.S. system of government in favor of an Islamic state.
"I wouldn't want to create the impression that I wouldn't like the government of the United States to be Islamic sometime in the future," Hooper said in a 1993 interview with the Minneapolis Star Tribune. "But I'm not going to do anything violent to promote that. I'm going to do it through education."
IMPORTANT NOTE: WND needs your help in supporting the defense of "Muslim Mafia" co-author P. David Gaubatz and his son Chris against CAIR's ongoing legal attack. Already, the book's revelations have led to formal congressional demands for three different federal investigations of CAIR. In the meantime, however, someone has to defend these two courageous investigators who have, at great personal risk, revealed so much about this dangerous group. Although WND has procured the best First Amendment attorneys in the country for their defense, we can't do it without your help. Please donate to WND's Legal Defense Fund now. Thank you.


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College of Pharmacy honors its top students
April 22, 2010
The top 37 students from the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo College of Pharmacy classes of 2011 and 2012 were presented awards at a banquet in their honor April 16 at the Hilo Yacht Club.
Dean John M. Pezzuto congratulated the awardees and recounted the tremendous progress of the College over the past few years. Remarks were also given by Dr. Luoluo Hong, UH Hilo vice chancellor for student affairs, Rob Parke, district team leader, Target, and Roger Thomas, Target team leader, Kailua-Kona store.
The keynote speaker was Victor Yanchick, immediate past president of the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy and dean of Virginia Commonwealth University. He spoke about the pursuit of excellence and leadership in pharmacy.
Students honored from the class of 2011 include: Cherie Chu, Natalie Codianne, Amber Duncan, Ceslee Fukuhara, Lisa Hagiwara, Ashley Hori, Oh-Young Kim, Ellen Loney, Annie Mar, Ryan Mashiyama, Erika Miyahira, Casey Ogata, Rochelle Oledzki, EnochJoh Ronduen, Quinn Taira, Jonathan Tam, Jessica Toyama, and Veneta Tsonev. Students honored from the class of 2012 include: Lawrence Chan, Bernie Cheng, Megan Ching, Raeanne Fuller, Carol Lynn Goo, Richelle Hirata, Susan Kang, Daralyn Kawamoto, Paul Kim, Kari Kurihara, Amber Laird, Tanya Moore, Brian Niimi, Alexandra Perez, Bryceson Tanaka, Henry Tran, Sally Van, Wendy Yamasaki-Herring and Marina Yeh.
The banquet was made possible thanks to a gift provided by Target. According to Thomas, the company applauds excellence and was pleased to partner with the College of Pharmacy in hosting this first-time event.
See more news from 2010.


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Mary Ouellette, SheWillShootYou.com Zakk Wylde 's new signature edition guitar instruction collection titled 'Guitar Apprentice' is now available exclusively at Guitar Centers in the U.S. as of Oct. 1 and now the leader of the Black Label Society has released a humorous clip to promote his rock 'n' roll lessons. Recorded live at Wylde's on Black Vatican studio in Los Angeles, Calif. 'Guitar Apprentice' takes a song and methodically breaks it down to fifteen different levels of playing so anyone can follow along. Starting with one chord, users work their way up to playing all the guitar parts including all headbanging solos, but at their own pace. The set offers detailed explanations of all the details from signature rhythm patterns to tones and even pedals and gear. In the clip below Wylde barks out 'This ain't no video game!' to the camera, but it actually was a video game that inspired the project. Wylde told MusicRadar.com that when the developers of the project approached him they asked him what he thought about the 'Guitar Hero' video franchise. "I said it was awesome," Wylde said. "Who knows – you could have the next Jimmy Page or Dimebag or Yngwie coming out of that thing. Some kid starts out on that, and eventually he says, 'Man, I want to get a real guitar.' That's what you want to happen. To me, anything that promotes the guitar is good." Wylde also noted that this isn't easy, so be prepared. "We're talking from a very beginner to being about to play the solo to f—ing 'Crazy Horse'," Wylde explained. "And you can do it, too, but you have to put in the hours. You've got to practice and get your technique together. But it's all there, man." Head over to www.guitarapprentice.com for more information on the Zakk Wylde Signature Edition Guitar Apprentice. Watch Zakk Wylde's Video Teaser for 'Guitar Apprentice'
The rest is here:
Zakk Wylde Unveils Video Teaser For 'Guitar Apprentice' Instructional Video Series


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When people refer to the "meaning of a name", they are most likely referring to the etymology, which is the original literal meaning. This website looks at the etymology and history of all types of given names.
Browse names and their meanings
Etymological elements in given names
Browse other topics in the glossary
Articles and current events about names